Pink salmon, also called Humpback Salmon, (Oncorhynchus gorbuscha), North Pacific food fish, family Salmonidae, weighing about 2 kilograms (4 1/2 pounds) and marked with large, irregular spots. It often spawns on tidal flats, the young entering the sea immediately after hatching. The alternative name humpback salmon refers to the hump that develops on the back of the breeding male. See alsosalmon.

Pink salmon (Oncorhynchus gorbuscha)

Painted especially for Encyclopaedia Britannica by Tom Dolan, under the supervision of Loren P. Woods, Chicago National History Museum

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originally, the large fish now usually called the Atlantic salmon (Salmo salar), though more recently the name has been applied to similar fishes of the same family (Salmonidae), especially the Pacific salmon, which constitute the genus Oncorhynchus.

The families Salmonidae and Osmeridae demonstrate a transition between freshwater and marine life cycles. All species of salmonids spawn in fresh water, but the Pacific pink salmon (Onchorhynchus gorbuscha) has reduced the freshwater stage to the spawning migration and incubation of the eggs. As soon as the eggs hatch and the yolk sac is absorbed, the pink salmon fry migrate to sea. Some...